Gov. Asa Hutchinson's son pleaded innocent to his fourth driving-while-intoxicated charge Thursday.
William Asa Hutchinson III's attorney, Chad Atwell, filed an innocent plea in West Fork District Court on Hutchinson's behalf Thursday, court clerk Vicky Mesplay said. His court date is set for Sept. 13.
Hutchinson was charged with DWI after Arkansas State Police stopped him around 3 a.m. May 28 near West Fork, according to police documents. Initial arrest reports say officers charged him with DWI, speeding and refusing to submit to a blood-alcohol content test.
Hutchinson was booked into the Washington County jail but was released on a $1,626 bond at 4:36 a.m.
According to arrest reports, Hutchinson, 42, was charged with DWI in 1996 and 2001.
Hutchinson had another DWI charge arising from a car accident on Jan. 24, 2016, on Interstate 49 near Fayetteville, where he reportedly crashed his pickup truck into a guardrail just before 4 a.m. State police responding to the crash described Hutchinson's eyes as "bloodshot and watery," according to police reports.
Hutchinson pleaded innocent.
In November of 2017, a Fayetteville judge convicted Hutchinson for driving while intoxicated, careless and prohibited driving and refusing to submit to a chemical test, but those charges were dismissed because of errors in citations.
A first citation marked the conditions during the accident as "daylight," despite the accident occurring at 3 a.m., and a second citation correcting the first listed the location of the incident incorrectly.
Atwell argued that Hutchinson never received the citation actually used against him in court and that the statute of limitations on the corrected citation had passed. Circuit Judge Mark Lindsay agreed; the case was dismissed in July 2017.
In May of 2016, after receiving the DWI arrest, Hutchinson was arrested on drug charges in Alabama that alleged he tried to sneak a psychoactive drug into a music festival.
Hutchinson is a lawyer in Rogers.
Metro on 07/20/2018